Europe is one of seven regions within the International Association of Facilitators. The IAF Europe team members
volunteer their time to plan and support activities and services for IAF members living in Europe, supported by
Entendu Ltd.. Contact us at pamela.lupton-bowers@iaf-europe.eu; gary.austin@iaf-europe.eu; kristin.reinbach@iafeurope.eu; rosemary.cairns@iaf-europe.eu, or speak with Ben Richardson or Nicki Cadogan of Entendu at
office@iaf-europe.eu.

ABOUT THE NEWSLETTER
The IAF Europe Newsletter is published monthly by the IAF Europe Regional Team for members of the International
Association of Facilitators living within Europe.
Editor: Rosemary Cairns
Design: Christian Grambow | www.christiangrambow.com
Contributors: Ann Alder, Inverclyde Now, Fiona MacNeill, Tony Mann, Gillian Martin Mehers, Penny Walker, Perry
Walker, Michael Wilkinson, Martin Gilbraith, Elaine Stewart
Cover picture: Naomi MacPherson of Aileymill Primary School commits her conversation to the World Cafe tablecloth. (Picture courtesy Inverclyde Now/Elaine Stewart) For story, see World Cafe gives voice to Scottish students
page 27.

Facilitating remotely
How technological advancements are helping usher in a
new era of collaborative working!
By Tony Mann

There will be a session (and potentially a pre-Conference Workshop) on a new development in virtual,
online interaction, using some of the latest technological advances and applying facilitation principles to
make the environment truly collaborative. There is the potential for real-time, simultaneous interaction in
an online environment with audio/video connectivity, where anyone, from any location can move and
work with the data being generated. This article explains the history and how recent science fiction is
becoming a reality, in a way that we, as facilitators, can engage people through the virtual world.

The Dilemma in Virtual Meetings
Online meetings are now in vogue. There is a
plethora of technology companies offering to
connect people. However, what stands out more
than anything is the fact that it is invariably a ‘one
to all’ format – that is: one person ‘presents’ or
speaks to the ‘audience’. Especially in Webinars,
which is the more commercial end of the market,
people present their ideas/expertise in a one-way
communication stream. If anyone is on camera at
all, it is the presenter and the rest of the audience
is hidden from view. Interaction is often limited to
writing questions for the presenter to answer, or
completing surveys that they offer to the audience.
In contrast, ‘Second Life’ (for example see http://
secondlife.com), allows people to interact as
avatars/‘characters’ and to visit different locations
(e.g. whiteboard and auditorium). People connect
voice over the internet (VoIP) and have
conversations, which although meaningful, lack
‘depth’. There is little opportunity to work
collaboratively. Some other simple programs allow
people to draw on whiteboards. This, in many
ways, belittles the real nature of collaboration and
creativity, reducing the interaction to drawing lines
and boxes on a page.

4 | IAF EUROPE NEWSLETTER | 08/2010

Transferring the Facilitator’s Philosophy to the
Virtual World
A Facilitator’s underlying aim when people
come together is to ensure effective interaction and
to make sure that people engage effectively with
the information that they create and develop.
When we, as facilitators, think about virtual
meetings, our primary focus is on whether the
technology will enhance or interfere with the
collaboration; and the ability of the people to
tackle issues, solve problems, shape ideas, develop
solutions and create new patterns of thinking.
Consequently, if we are to facilitate ‘virtual
meetings’ of people in different locations, and get
the interaction we strive for, we need technology
that suits the philosophy we adhere to.
Combating the Lack of Group Participation
Most people have experienced a degree of
frustration when trying to collaborate with others
in a co-located setting while using a PC. Although it
is possible for all to view the information being
displayed on the screen/projected image, it is
much more difficult for all to interact with it.
Typically, one person is in control of the computer,
via a single mouse and keyboard, while the others

CONFERENCE ARTICLE

5

Photos courtesy of Tony Mann

look on. That person can find it difficult to
handover control to the others, and the others find
it awkward to ask for or take control. Several
studies have shown that physical input devices,
such as a mouse, a pen, or a keyboard, tend to
stay with one person throughout a group activity
(Jordan & Henderson, 1995; Rogers & Lindley, 2004;
Trimble, Wales, & Gossweiler, 20031). The effect can
be sub-optimal communication of ideas and activity
progression. Likewise, it can be hard for the others
to follow what the person at the computer is doing
and know when and how to express their ideas
and suggestions that will enable the person in
control to act upon them in the way they intended
(Scaife, Halloran, & Rogers, 20022).
If we are to achieve all that online
communication can offer then the aim must be to
increase collaboration of the many and reduce the
influence of the one person who controls the
technological interface.

Latest Technology – what can it offer?
One of the newest and possibly most exciting
advances is multi-touch technology - see http://
www.perceptivepixel.com/index.html to view one
of the early research models. It enables people to
interact and handle data simultaneously, using
multiple touches. Many of us will have experienced
touch screens (e.g. buying tickets at a train station)
and end-users are now beginning to explore what it
could mean for them. Early multi-touch screens
were merely ‘toys’, for example, moving photos
around, flipping them and re-sizing them. Those of
you who saw ‘Minority Report’ will have seen Tom
Cruise handling data using a form of multi-touch.
In ‘Indecent Proposal’ Michael Douglas was ‘flicking
pages of information using a virtual ‘glove’. Now,
following the ‘research’ and these early science
fiction examples have come the ‘development’ and
practical application. Hospitals are developing the
use of multi-touch screens to allow the doctor to

08/2010 | IAF EUROPE NEWSLETTER | 5

CONFERENCE ARTICLE

6

show different aspects of data to aid patient
understanding. Police are experimenting, using
multi-touch screens to display crime scene
information.
These developments come at a time when
bandwidth is increasing and we are now able, for
instance, to stream whole movies in HD into our
homes. Video and audio connectivity is now fully
available. Further, the development of mobile
phone applications means that we can easily email
each other, access the internet, ‘bump’ our phones
against each others in order to swap photos. We
can have video calls. Combine all of this (with
some other clever bits of technology) and you get a
multi-touch, multi-wall application.
The ‘Facilitation Multi-Wall’ is in its
development stage by LamasaTech of Sunderland
UK, advised by Tony Mann of Resource Strategic
Change Facilitators. It offers the opportunity to
connect people/groups from different locations and
enables them to interact with the same data, at the
same time. If you would like to see an early
prototype of Facilitation Multi-Wall being
demonstrated go to: http://
www.resourcestrategicchange.com/multiwall.html.
Working at a multi-touch screen at their own
location, people will be able to upload the data,
which could be a technical drawing/diagram,
spreadsheet, or any other document they wish to
explore/discuss. As the short video shows, the
participants can also send electronic post it notes
via their mobile phones. Users can send them one
at a time or in batches; this way the facilitator can
ensure that there is equality of participation. Once
the data is on screen anyone, anywhere will be
able to move it and add to it. In addition the
software can offer a wide range of techniques (e.g.
electronic post its), tools (e.g. fishbone diagram,
force field, four box model, etc.) and even client’s
own organisational models.
The aim is that each participating group could
be seen and or heard via audio and/or video,
displayed in the corner of the screen, likewise the
facilitator, who could also be at a remote location.
If those taking part in the activity decide, then data
can be ‘broken off’ and taken by one of the groups
to work on and brought back to the forum when
completed. The data could be moved to another
multi-touch screen in the same room/location or at
a distant location as the technology enables groups

6 | IAF EUROPE NEWSLETTER | 08/2010

anywhere to work in this technological
environment.
Distant Collaboration
Previous research has suggested that if people
have met on an earlier occasion and interacted,
then remote working is not an issue. The research
identified a major extension of collaboration, best
described in the path-breaking work of,
Wikinomics. According to the authors, this
participation ‘has reached a tipping point where
new forms of mass collaboration are changing how
goods and services are invented, produced,
marketed, and distributed on a global basis’.
Tapscott and Williams propose four key principles
of mass collaboration:
Openness
Peering
Sharing
Acting globally
This paradigm shift was the cover story of Time
Magazine in 2006, where the person of the year
was announced as ‘You’ – referring to the
collaboration revolution on the web and the new
digital democracy and citizen activism enabled by
the small contributions of millions of people on the
net (Grossman, 2006).
When people are in the same room it is easy for
the facilitator to manage the interactions between
the groups. It will, however, be essential that
appropriate ‘protocols’ for multi-wall, technology
are created and tested to maximise the benefit of
remote group working.
Reducing our Carbon Footprint
Diverse groups of practitioners, decision
makers, policy makers and community activists
spanning geographical divides will increasingly
need to work together. Increasingly manufacturing
and final production are separated. Assembly is
done in a different country from the basic
manufacturing. Colleagues work together but in
different geographical locations. The drive for a
work-life balance has meant that people often work
from home and interact with customers and
suppliers across the country and indeed the world.
The need to reduce our carbon footprint is urgent
and we need technology that will encourage us and
enable us NOT to travel.

CONFERENCE ARTICLE

7

Photos courtesy of Tony Mann

Photos courtesy of Tony Mann

08/2010 | IAF EUROPE NEWSLETTER | 7

Photos courtesy of Tony Mann

The Need to Influence Technological Development
The need for interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary interaction will increase in a highly
globalised, dynamically interconnected world.
Online collaboration, with greatly reduced monetary
and carbon costs, will, with the right tools, become
the norm. At a recent event sponsored by a
government department the MD of a small high–
tech explained how he had to go to India
numerous times a year to train, support and
oversee changes in manufacturing practices. He
bemoaned the lack of suitable internet technology
that would enable him to, not only to talk to the
team in India but illustrate new concepts and get
their input. We as facilitators need to be at the
forefront in the development of online technology
in order to influence the potential for collaboration.
Can Online Collaboration Really Work?
It is well known that if we have met someone
face-to-face and witnessed their mannerisms,
experienced their humour and engaged with them,
then we can relate to that person even if we are
remote from them. Emails, for example, carry the
personality ‘signature’ of the sender. The addition
of a video/audio link can further enhance this
interaction. Families talk across the world on Skype
and it feels almost as if the other person is there
next to you. Nevertheless, many organisations have
abandoned the video link in favour of the oldfashioned telephone conference because despite
promising a lot, video conferencing added very

8 | IAF EUROPE NEWSLETTER | 08/2010

Photos courtesy of Tony Mann

little, primarily because there was minimal
interaction.
However, the multi-touch screen, with its ability
to enable simultaneous, real-time interaction can
offer a new level of collaboration. It can be used
for a wide variety of ‘meetings’ and ‘workshops’
where people need to engage with each other and
handle visual data and information. The use of the
multi-touch, multi-screen application can enhance
virtual multi-location meetings and workshops. The
real challenge will be to get groups up from sitting
at the table and working at the ‘wall’. However, we
as facilitators, have a great tradition of encouraging
groups to change their traditional style of working.
Using the multi-touch screen on the wall will not
only be a novel experience for some but an
enriching one as well.
So what is our Role in Online Collaboration?
The facilitator’s role when facilitating using
multi-wall touch screen technology is to:
Identify the best format for the interactivity
(e.g. ‘All’ - everyone’ contributing, ‘One to all’ one person on behalf others, ‘All to One’ –
everyone openly contributing to one place – the
wall)
Select the most appropriate technique/tool/
model to use, to manage the data/information
and bring this up on the screen as a ‘backdrop’
Break the data down into manageable ‘chunks’
and encourage sub-group work by getting
people to work at different screens to explore
the issues and develop ideas to bring back to
the main group

CONFERENCE ARTICLE

9

We, as we have always done, can ensure that
people feel connected and involved and that they
have the opportunity to input as much as anyone
else – this will be true whether everyone is in the
same room or not. It will be even more important
to ‘watch’ everyone when people are working
remotely and to use effective ‘protocols’ to ensure
effective interaction.
Session and Workshop at the European IAF
Conference
In the session during the main Conference,
people will be able to see the Facilitation Multi-Wall
and experience how it works. If there is enough
interest then we will run a pre-workshop on
Thursday 14th October. In that workshop there will
be an opportunity to practice using the Facilitation
Multi-Wall and to be part of creating the protocols.
We aim to experiment with the technology and
explore how it can be applied in different
situations. Virtual meetings and are here to stay
and we need to play our part in making them truly
collaborative. Those that take part in the workshop
and session will have the benefit of being in at the
beginning, be able to fashion the future and add to
our scope of influence as facilitators in an online,
virtual world. The aim is to create a list of multiscreen facilitators, so that when a client buys this
technology LamasTech can suggest a facilitator who
understands the protocols. Come and join the
workshop and the session and see the future!
Footnotes
1) Trimble,J.,Wales,R.,&Gossweiler,R.
(2003).NASA’sMERBoard.InK.O’Hara,M. Perry, E.
Churchill, &D. Russell (Eds.), Public and situated
displays: social and interactional aspectsof
shareddisplaytechnologies(pp. 18–44). Dordrecht,
theNether- lands: Kluwer.
2) Scaife, M., Halloran, J., &Rogers, Y. (2002).
Let’sworktogether: Supportingtwo
partycollaborationswithnewformsof
sharedinteractiverepresentations. InM. BlayFornarino, A. Pinna-Dery, K. Schmidt, &P. Zaraté
(Eds.), Cooperativesystems design: A challenge
of the mobility age(pp. 123–138). Amsterdam:
IOS Press.

Tony specialises principally in facilitation. He has been a practitioner for over 20
years. In that time he has developed the Process
IcebergÒ methodology that is recognised as one
of the most effective facilitation Programmes
available. Through the three Stage Programme he
has trained several hundred facilitators across
the UK, Europe in Australasia. His approach has
been adopted in New Zealand and is delivered in
Poland by Zmiana pl.
Tony is a leading member of The Centre
for Facilitation, a group of expert Facilitators,
who work together to develop facilitation as an
approach to organisational change, project and
risk management. The Centre for Facilitation is
working with Leeds Metropolitan University in
the development of academic study leading eventually to a Masters.
Tony has written a book and manual on
Facilitation and his new book: Participate for a
Change and the accompanying manual is coming out in August.

3) Tapscott and Williams (2006) (p. 10)

08/2010 | IAF EUROPE NEWSLETTER | 9

ARTICLE

10

Crowd Wise

A new approach to participative decision-making
By Perry Walker

Introduction
Crowd Wise is simultaneously very new, and
very old. Its venerability comes from incorporating
a method of voting called consensus voting, which
is over 200 years old. Its novelty comes from the
way that voting and discussion are integrated.
Its aim is to provide a way for a group to take
decisions that is participative, constructive and
practical. Being participative, as I need hardly say
to this audience, is essential if decisions are to
reflect the values and interests of people affected
by it. It is constructive in that the particular form of
voting encourages people to find common ground,
and discourages polarization. It is practical, first, in
that the voting short-circuits some consensusbased approaches to decision-making, which are
powerful but lengthy. It is practical, secondly, in its
flexibility. It works equally well as a single event of
two to three hours and as a much longer process.
There is no limit on numbers. A current project
offers all the 1500 members of AFC Wimbledon, a
community-owned football club, the opportunity to
take part.
How it works
There are several elements. Crowd Wise
provides different ways to tackle each one.
1. A range of options is developed.
2. Consensus emerges through a combination of

1. A range of options is developed

10 | IAF EUROPE NEWSLETTER | 08/2010

Photo courtesy of Perry Walker

discussion and voting:
Discussion leads to options being adapted to
widen their appeal, and sometimes to
mergers between options.
As stated above, Crowd Wise uses a form of
voting called ‘consensus voting’. All
participants are invited to rank the options in
order of preference. The higher the
preference, the greater the number of points
given to that option.
The votes are counted. The higher the
number of points earned by the top option,

2. Consensus voting takes place.

3. There is a range of options, no

the greater the degree of consensus.
How Crowd Wise produces better, more acceptable
decisions
1. There is a range of options. This is important
because decisions are rarely a matter of black
and white.
2. The options reflect the views of the participants.
The options are either developed by the
participants, or, if they were prepared before
the discussion, they are adapted to reflect the
values and interests of the participants.
3. The option that is chosen also reflects the views
of the participants. This is because:
The voting reflects people’s preferences on
all the options. This contrasts with majority
voting where people vote only for one
option.
The chosen option is often a composite of
some or all of the original options.
The voting shows how much consensus there
is. If there is not enough, that is a sign to
continue the process.
4. People find common ground with each other.
With consensus voting, each participant has an
incentive to engage with the other participants,
in the hope of persuading them to rate their
preferred option, say, third instead of fifth. This
incentive would not exist in an either/or vote,
when everyone will talk up their choice and
criticise the alternative. Nor would it exist if
people were not expressing their preferences on
all the options. Furthermore, no-one votes
against any option: they vote for all the options,
to different degrees. In addition, people have
an incentive to engage with the other
participants, to understand how they can make
their preferred option more appealing to others.

ot only black and white.

4. The voting reflects people’s preferences on all options.

An example of finding common
ground in a situation of conflict
A forerunner of Crowd Wise was
used in Belfast in 1986 to discuss
the constitutional status of Northern
Ireland. Over 200 people, including
politicians - both unionists and Sinn
Féin ‒ chose this outcome from a list
of ten options: Northern Ireland to
have devolution and power-sharing
with a Belfast-Dublin-London tripartite agreement. It was a mini-Good
Friday Agreement, twelve years
ahead of its time!

Practical advice

5. People find common ground with each other.

08/2010 | IAF EUROPE NEWSLETTER | 11

ARTICLE

11

12

ARTICLE

CASE STUDY
Use: Developing policies and strategy
Topic: "How much power should local councils (parish and town
councils) have in the 21st century?"
Format: Two hour event at University of Gloucestershire Summer Seminar in
Cheltenham in July 2009, for 50 chairs and clerks of parish and town councils.

1. Starting options
There were six pre-prepared options.
2. Vote and discuss
At the start, each option was introduced
by a speaker and there was an initial vote.
Then the speakers divided themselves
between the six tables at which participants
were sitting. They had ten minutes to
present their option in more detail and get
feedback on it. They then moved to the next
table, visiting all of the tables over an hour.
3. Revising the options
Each speaker then had the opportunity to
amend and/or merge their proposal. At the
end of this stage, there were three options.
4. Vote and discuss
There was a second vote on the three
options, with the results discussed briefly by
the whole group.
How the options evolved
In the initial six options, the two extremes
were:
A. Local councils should not have more
power.
F. Local councils should have full power to
deliver all services in the locality.

12 | IAF EUROPE NEWSLETTER | 08/2010

When the options were amended, the
changes to F. included:
Increase duties as well as powers.
Acknowledge that this increase in
power and duties brings an increased
need for quality control and
accountability.
At the merger stage, Option F was
merged with option E. The merged option
read:
Local councils should have powers
and duties to deliver all appropriate
services in the locality. This should be
accompanied by increased: resources;
quality control; and accountability.
In the second vote, the merger of E
and F came first, just ahead of an option
which said that local authorities should
have a duty to devolve to local councils.
These two merge to form the final,
consensus, option:
Principal authorities and other public
service providers should have a statutory
duty to devolve the delivery of services
to the local council. This duty should be
supported by devolving financial
resources, quality control, accountability
and training.

Visit the venue and have a rehearsal
One example when it would have helped to visit
the venue beforehand was an event where we had to
move the tables and chairs around after the previous
session. The result was that some people mislaid their
papers. This meant that the session could not start
until, first, everyone turned up – and some people were
fifteen minutes late – and, second, everyone had
checked that the papers in front of them were theirs,
so the missing ones could be identified and reunited
with their owner.

The starting question should be open
A closed question is one you can answer ‘yes’ or
‘no’. “Shall we take the bus?” is a closed question:
“How shall we get to the cinema?” is an open question. We have held two events where in hindsight the
question was too closed.
In December 2008, an event at Thinkspace, a quarterly space for discussing issues of participation, convened by the School of Peace Studies at the University
of Bradford, considered the question:
“Does the individual have the right to choose how or
when to die?”
An event held at nef in March 2009 used this twopart question:
“1. Should the UK government have the power to detain without trial?
2. If so, under what conditions?”
A more open question might have asked: “how
should suspected terrorists or criminals be
treated?”
Encourage people to vote for all the options
People are free to choose how many options they
vote for, but it is fair to point out the implications of
their choice. For example, a recent ballot paper said:
“Give your preferences for as many options as
you wish (1st, 2nd, 3rd etc.)
If you give a preference for all five options, your
1st preference will score 5 points, your 2nd preference
will score 4 points etc. You will score 15 points in total.
However, if you express a preference for say only two
options, your 1st preference will score 2 points and
your 2nd preference will score 1 point, so you will only
score 3 points in total.”

Where Crowd Wise is part of a wider event, plan
its integration with that event carefully
For instance, the Urban Forum Crowd Wise
event was woven into the organisation’s annual conference. We were able to turn this to our advantage
in designing the timetable. Part of that timetable
was:
10.45 Ideas marketplace in which teams developed
options
12.15 Lunch + AGM, during which we collected the
flipcharts from each team, typed them up,
printed out sheets showing all the options, and
distributed these sheets [and ballot papers].
[1.30] A first vote took place. Each team then
amended its proposal in the light of the vote
and put its revised proposal onto a flipchart.
2.30 Keynote speeches. This gave us time to type up
the new flipcharts and print out the revised
option sheets.

But the question should not be too open
At the Molten Festival in Barking in August 2009,
the topic was:
‘What’s the point of a festival?’
Afterwards, all those involved in the event felt
that the title was unsatisfactory. It seemed to enable
speakers etc. to lump together everything that had a
point. We needed a title that allowed us to make
choices. Our first thought was that a better title
would have been: ‘What is the single most important point of a festival?’
However, different festivals can and do achieve
different things. So perhaps the title should have
been: ‘What is the single most important point of
the Molten festival?’

Have at least two votes if possible
Wherever possible, we prefer to have a first
vote at or near the start, and another vote later. Even
if people are not very clear on the options when they
first vote, experiencing the process early on means
that they understand much better what the main vote
is about. It’s important to signpost, however, that the
first vote is just a test of the waters and the main vote
comes later.

Perry Walker runs the democracy and
participation programme at nef (the new economics foundation). He is on the board of Involve.
Perry has led the development of Democs, a conversation game, which provides a
unique opportunity for small groups to find out
about complex policy issues like climate change
or nanotechnology, to shape and share their
opinions, and to provide feedback for policymakers. Democs has attracted several thousand participants. More recently, he has developed Open
Up, a way of setting out the arguments on an
issue on a single sheet of paper or computer
screen so that people can come to an opinion
even more quickly than with Democs.
He has also designed and facilitated
numerous participatory projects including: future
search conferences (usually for 64 people over
two days); Imagine, a workshop-based visioning
process using appreciative story-telling; and the
People’s Café project, spreading discussion cafes
to a range of people, including those with learning difficulties.

14 | IAF EUROPE NEWSLETTER | 08/2010

ABOUT NEF

Nef’s aim is to improve quality of life by
promoting innovative solutions that challenge
mainstream thinking on economic,
environment and social issues. Our current
emphasis is on helping to bring about a ‘Great
Transition’ to a low carbon, high well-being
economy.
Our strategic priorities over the next four
years are to set out a clear and compelling
vision of that new economy, to show why it is
needed and what needs to happen to get there
and to start building public support for such a
fundamental and rapid transition.

human beings, we are pattern makers. Our
brains seek order in the information they
receive from our senses. We seek to establish patterns that become recognisable to us in order to
make sense of the world we live in. We recognise
and value patterns in nature, in language, in society.
This ability to form and manipulate patterns
allows us to integrate new knowledge into existing
frameworks, to relate new concepts to those we
already have and to make connections between
many discrete and distinct observations.
The ability to build patterns is fundamental to
our ability to learn. As we acquire new information
and knowledge we integrate and assimilate that
knowledge into the related knowledge we already
have, making small and subtle shifts to the existing
patterns to accommodate the new ideas. In childhood, the existing patterns are flexible and fluid,
shifting easily to accommodate new elements. In
adulthood, this process may be less comfortable
and may take more time. New ideas or knowledge
may, ultimately, be rejected if the learner cannot
find a way of blending the new knowledge into the
existing patterns.
We also use patterns in the development of
skills. Skill development requires practice and repetition: building and repeating a pattern of movement, action or thinking. Learning a physical skill –
to the point at which the movement becomes
grooved – means repeating an effective pattern

until the muscle memory takes over and the action
becomes automatic. Building competence, whether
physical, intellectual or social requires pattern recognition: the patterns of behaviour that achieve the
desired results.
As facilitators we work to help others to make
and break patterns. In supporting their learning,
we aspire to help them to build those patterns that
will be useful to them. These may be ‘technical’
patterns of language, number, sequence or process. They may be thinking patterns that support
problem-solving, creativity, logical analysis or empathy. They may be patterns of behaviour that
demonstrate trust, influence or integrity in relationships.
But at times we also seek to break patterns: to
help our groups to ‘unlearn’. Before they can move
on in the learning process we may need to help
them to reject long –held patterns of behaviour or
assumptions that have proved incorrect or of limited use.
Many writers and practitioners make reference
to the ‘art of facilitation’. Great facilitators allow
learners to become artists and designers: pattern
makers who understand the connections between
multiple individual elements and can connect them
in ways that create both form and function. Facilitators help learners to check and test these patterns, choosing which to retain, which to reject and
which to build upon. This choice is the key element
in moving towards attitudinal and behavioural

08/2010 | IAF EUROPE NEWSLETTER | 15

CONFERENCE UPDATE

15

16

ARTICLE

change: something that only comes about when
the learner wants to initiate real change.
In my work as a facilitator of learning, I’ve explored this concept of pattern making and pattern
breaking and seen how powerful it is in action.
When my very young son was learning to count he
consistently counted,

Ann Alder
Ann Alder is an experienced facilitator and designer of experiential learning tools and resources. She
has worked in learning and development for almost 30
years and has developed an international reputation
for training learning and development professionals in
the skills needed to facilitate experiential learning.
Ann originally moved into the facilitation of experiential learning from a background in teaching and
teacher education. She became a facilitator at Brathay
in the UK, a leading centre in using experiential learning in personal, team, management and organisational development. She was then appointed Staff
Development Manager and was responsible for the
recruitment and professional development of
Brathay’s team of skilled facilitators. Since 1992 Ann
has been co-owner and director of her own business,
providing resources and learning design support to
organisations and L+D professionals committed to
using interactive, experiential learning tools and
methods. In the last 5 years she has facilitated workshop sessions at ASTD in the USA, CIPD Conference in
the UK, The World of Learning Conference in the UK,
the Annual Career Development Conference of the
United Nations in Rome and the Annual Conference of
the School of Continuing Education of the Chinese
Culture University in Taiwan.
Ann Alder is the author of Pattern Making, Pattern
Breaking: Using Past Experience and New Behaviour
in Training, Education and Change Management, to be
published in November 2010 by Gower. See http://
tiny.cc/sl946

16 | IAF EUROPE NEWSLETTER | 08/2010

“One, two, three, four, five, seven, eight….”
On one occasion my response was, “What happened to six?”, to which he replied confidently,
“One, two, three, four, five, what happened to
six, seven, eight…”
A repeated pattern, yes, but clearly not yet a
pattern that is entirely useful! However, I still see
this too frequently in organisational learning –
learners being trained to do something without
understanding the concepts behind what they are
doing or behaving in ways that are habitual without any awareness of the impact of that behaviour. I also see it in functional teams who carry
out redundant tasks or work in inefficient ways
because, “this is how we do it here”.
As a facilitator, my focus is on three things:
sensitivity to what I am seeing and hearing around
me (pattern recognition), diagnosis and interpretation of what this means and what impact it has
(pattern evaluation) and movement to action
(support in breaking old, redundant patterns and
replacing them with more effective and rewarding
ones.)
To support this I have created practical
‘learning tools’ that help people to work through
this process in ways that are engaging, fun and
challenging. These activities help me to hold up a
mirror so that learners can see the patterns they
have created and repeated, challenge and confront
them and ultimately re-form them.
During the October 2010 IAF Conference in Helsinki, I will be running a practical learning workshop to explore these ideas in practice, using experiential learning tools and principles. The session will explore how we can use our facilitation
skills in training and learning contexts and offer
new patterns to individuals, teams and organisations. I’d love to see you there.

Tasting the Future
Tangy fresh process
By Penny Walker

As you may have noticed, I’m a process aficionado.
I love to hear about innovative ways of helping
people have the conversations they need. I love to
try out new processes as a facilitator and a participant. I network with fellow facilitators through
AMED, the IAF and a facilitators’ group on linked-in.
I read about unorthodox approaches, and sometimes I even try them with paying clients.
On June 28, I had the great treat of being a
participant in someone else’s workshop. There I
saw for real – not in a training setting – open
space, world cafe, graphic facilitation and live plenary mind mapping all used during the same meeting.
The event was the first ‘assembly’ for Tasting
the Future, a collaborative whole-systems attempt
to innovate the food system. It was organised by
WWF, ADAS, the Food and Drink Federation and
Food Ethics Council. Facilitation was provided by
Hara Practice and Natural Innovation and other
members of the hosting team. There were also

(Photo courtesy of Penny Walker)

some people doing graphic recording, from Intuitive
Intelligence Training.
Some exciting conversations and actions
emerged, and you can read more about them on
the Tasting the Future ning. I’m going share some
of the things I learned about process.
Dressing the room
When we arrived we sat where we liked at
small tables covered with flip chart paper, with a
small stack of coloured pens, crayons and chalk.
There were small bowls of sweets and a colourful
cartoon diagram introducing us to world cafe. And
on each table there was a unique food or herb
seedling, grown at Hackney City Farm, which you
could buy to take home if you liked. Plants included apple mint, chamomile, lettuces, cabbage
and tomato.
Setting the tone
There were a couple of phrases I scribbled
down during the opening session. The hosting

(Photo courtesy of Penny Walker)

08/2010 | IAF EUROPE NEWSLETTER | 17

ARTICLE

17

(Photo courtesy of Penny Walker)

team asked us to be strong enough to work with
our differences, to become a community of innovators, to speak with intention. We were invited to
‘listen louder’ if we disagreed with what someone
was saying, so that we could better understand
their perspective rather than blot it out with our
own.
Meta-planning
Following a couple of rounds of world cafe, we
were asked to come up with our best ideas about
what we wanted to change in the current system.
We wrote these on A5 size stickies, and these were
then meta-planned (clustered) in plenary. Bear in
mind there were over 100 participants, and the
facilitators among you will recognise the audacity
of this.
The hosting team had mikes and runners, and
the lead facilitator began as usual by asking for
any one idea. She then asked people with the
same idea on their sticky note to shout ’snap!’ This
was a great way of gathering up the clusters very
rapidly. A supporter did the actual sticking up,
while the facilitator asked for the next idea. It didn’t take long for all the ideas to be gathered and
clustered.
Whole group mind-mapping
Another daring bit of process for such a large
group was the method used to identify topics for
the subsequent open space session on action plan-

18 | IAF EUROPE NEWSLETTER | 08/2010

(Photo courtesy of Penny Walker)

ning. We all gathered around a long wall, where a
large blank area of paper was taped up.
The focus question was posed: “Where do we
need to take action?” (Actually there was an adjective in there, but my memory and my photo have
let me down. Could’ve been ‘where do we need to
take collective action’ or ‘urgent action’.) Then the
facilitator asked us to write our name legibly on a
sticky note if we had an idea we wanted to add to
the mind map.
Rules for the mind map included that there’s
no such thing as a bad idea, it’s fine to disagree
with a previous idea, and the owner of the idea
gets to say where on the map it goes. There were
support facilitators collecting up the names so the
lead facilitator could call people by name. Other
members of the team had mikes and ensured each
person making a contribution could be heard. Two
of the team were scribes, with four colours of
marker pens. As a new theme and idea was added,
the scribes would write it up on the evolving map.
One at a time, those who wanted to offered
ideas for action, and said whether they were twigs
to add to existing branches, or new branches.
This went on for about 30 minutes. It was
beautifully controlled, and everyone who wanted to
had an opportunity to contribute.
When the mind map was complete, we were
each given three dots and invited to use them to
indicate which actions we thought were the most
important. Over tea, the dots were counted and

(Photo courtesy of Penny Walker)

around a dozen action areas were identified which
had enough support to be the topics for the subsequent open space action planning session.
Open space
Over tea, the room was rearranged so there
was one large circle in the middle. The topics
which had emerged from the mind map were written up on large pieces of paper, each with a number which corresponded to a numbered part of the
room.
The method of sorting out who went to which
session was simpler than I’d seen before. There
was no signing up of participants to different topics, or assigning topics to time slots. Instead, there
was one 50 minute time slot. Within that time, participants could go to whichever topic they wanted,
and leave it whenever they wanted. This is the law
of two feet.
Topics were hosted by volunteer hosts, who
put themselves forward while the open space was
being organised. If a topic didn’t have a host, it
didn’t run. There was also the opportunity for hosts
to offer additional topics, and I think one was proposed at this stage.
Very soon we were ready to go to our spaces
and discuss our topic. The host had a prepared flip
chart where they were asked to record key information: topic title, who hosted, who participated,
three key points to share, and actions the group
would take (if any). The guidance was very clear on

(Photo courtesy of Penny Walker)

actions: they were to be things someone in the
group had agreed to take on, not recommendations
for action by others. As the facilitator said “We’re
the ones we’ve been waiting for”.
As the day progressed, a team of graphic recorders captured the highlights in this lovely illustration.

Penny Walker is an independent consultant, an experienced facilitator and trainer,
and a recognised expert and author on sustainable development. Working from her base in
North London, Penny helps large and small companies, NGOs and public bodies to create a better future. She also works with a range of partners and collaborators cooperating to help clients make changes at a strategic, cultural and
personal level. In her spare time, she is the chair
of Growing Communities, a ground-breaking social enterprise that grows and sells organic food
in Hackney, North London.
Penny posted this article on her blog
Facilitating Change for Sustainability July 2, 2010,
and kindly gave us permission to reprint it. The
session was facilitated by Maria Scordialos and
Sarah Whitely of Hara Practice. See the original
post at http://penny-walker.co.uk/blog/2010/07/
tasting-the-future-tangy-fresh-process/

08/2010 | IAF EUROPE NEWSLETTER | 19

CONFERENCE ARTICLE

20

The Seven Separators
of Great Facilitation
By Michael Wilkinson

What separates great facilitators from good
ones? Sure, every facilitator needs to know about
establishing ground rules, using appropriate tools,
and maintaining a safe environment. But is there a
set of skills that seem to distinguish the best facilitators from the rest of the pack?
We say, “Yes!” As facilitators and facilitation
trainers, we have worked with and trained more
than 12,000 facilitators since releasing our training
class The Effective Facilitator in 1993. While some
facilitators were beginners, most were experienced,
and many were very experienced. Through working
with this wide variation in proficiency, we identified what we believe are The Seven Separators the key skills that seem to separate the top facilitators from the average ones.
The seven skills shown on the right page are
based on our organization's experience and are just

a few of the key techniques covered by the facilitation methodology we teach in The Effective Facilitator. Your experience may be different and we welcome your comments. Twenty years ago, many
thought that a flip chart and a pen was all you
needed to be a good facilitator. Today, we know it
takes considerably more. Please join us in our
efforts to continually raise the bar on facilitation
excellence.

Michael will present this material at a one-day
pre-conference at the 2010 IAF Europe Conference
in Helsinki. Along with learning directly from the
author of the material, you will also have the opportunity to practice the techniques and receive
detailed feedback. Don’t miss this opportunity! To
learn more, see the IAF-Europe Conference website.

The Facilitators
Methodologytm
1

2
Preparing for Success

Getting the
Session Started

The Facilitation Cycle
4

The Power of the Pen

3

9
Focusing the Group

Closing the Session

5
Information Gathering

Group Dynamics
7
8

6
Managing
Dysfunction

10

Consensus
Building

Keeping the Energy
High

Agenda Setting

Cutline missing
20 | IAF EUROPE NEWSLETTER | 08/2010

Top facilitators know that it is important to establish
and maintain a high energy level. Whether you are
working with a group in a week-long program, or facilitating a quality team that meets for two hours once a
week, participants look to you to set the pace. Why set
it high? We have found that high energy does three
important things:

Engages the group by getting their attention, gaining
their interest, and keeping it fun

Energizes the topic indirectly (i.e., the facilitator’s
energy suggests to the participants, “This must be
important because this person seems to be excited
about it.”)

Increases the perception of facilitator’s selfconfidence (We find that facilitators with low energy
are perceived by participants as having low selfconfidence!)

In every facilitated session, there are specific times
when the facilitator stops speaking and looks to the
group to speak – such as brain-storming or listing exercises. Average facilitators figure out what questions they
want to ask. Great facilitators are aware that the way
they ask “starting questions” will greatly influence the
quality of the responses. So they ask starting questions
that draw a vivid image. People can “see” the question
and are very quickly able to respond with information
that is directly on the topic.

Every facilitation situation is unique. Yet top facilitators design customized processes to address a sponsor’s
need. Top facilitators have a core set of standard
agenda processes from which to draw and they know the
cues for determining which agenda is appropriate in a
given situation. They also have a method for building a
new agenda process from scratch when needed.

Good facilitators accept the responses given by participants and summarize when necessary. Top facilitators quickly analyze responses given and have a full
toolkit of follow-up question types to apply to a variety
of situations. Sometimes they will ask playback questions to verify what was said; other times they may ask
direct probes to challenge, redirection questions to get
back on topic, leading questions to get out of a hole, etc.

Average facilitators understand that dysfunctional
behavior by participants can derail a facilitated session and thus tend to be a bit fearful of dysfunction.
They often ignore the early forms of dysfunction and
hope that it goes away quickly should it occur.
Great facilitators know that hope is not a strategy!
During preparation, they seek to identify potential
dysfunction and take steps in advance for conscious
prevention, early detection and clean resolution of
dysfunctional behavior.
Should a dysfunction occur, they quickly recognize it and have specific strategies for addressing
the dysfunctions that commonly occur.

While average facilitators know the mechanics to
handle a group in a facilitated session, top facilitators carry the group through the process. While average facilitators cover the agenda items, top facilitators smoothly transition from one agenda item to the
next.
Top facilitators use check points every step of
the way: with every new agenda item, they review
what’s been done, preview what’s going to be done,
and explain how the new agenda item contributes to
the objectives established at the start of the session.
Top facilitators use examples to ensure that participants understand. Top facilitators have a model for
giving directions that allows them to always give
accurate, clear, and concise instructions.

Good facilitators do an adequate job of recording
the gist of what they heard the participants say.
They may change the wording here or there to clarify, and may record what the person “meant.”
Sometimes they may choose not to record certain
points that they deemed unimportant. In other
cases, they look to the group to decide whether a
point is worthy of recording.
Top facilitators recognize the “power of the
pen” and understand how abuse of the pen disempowers individuals and can cause dysfunctional
behavior. Top facilitators record the participants’
words (not necessarily all of them) instead of their
own. They write what was said, regardless of their
perception of value. Once written, they use their
follow-up questions to get the participant to clean
up the words.

08/2010 | IAF EUROPE NEWSLETTER | 21

CONFERENCE ARTICLE

21

CONFERENCE ARTICLE

22

The Drivers Model:
The Secrets to Facilitating Strategy
By Michael Wilkinson

Note: Michael will be presenting The Secrets to Facilitating Strategy at a special one-day preconference at the IAF Europe Conference in Helsinki. To learn more, see the IAF-Europe Conference
website (www.iaf-europe-conference.org).

Leadership Strategies has developed the Drivers Model, a method for taking a strategic approach to addressing a business situation. The
model provides a simple communication tool for
helping organizations construct a strategic plan.
The model is fully scalable and applies to Fortune
500 companies, non-profit organizations, a field
office, an individual department, a work team, etc.

There are four major steps in our standard
Drivers Model. What follows is a brief overview of
the four steps. For a sample deliverable, action
plan format, and list of terminology definitions, see
the detailed workshop description on the IAF
Europe Conference website.

VISION
Where We
Want To Be





 Monitor/Reassess

CSF´s

CURRENT
Where We
Are Today

CSF´s

22 | IAF EUROPE NEWSLETTER | 08/2010

Education is our fundamental
focus. We offer programs that
improve the industry skills of our
members.
We believe it is our responsibility
to use the resources of our
industry to help improve the local
community.
We will implement policies that
ensure that a suitable membership balance is maintained
between planners and suppliers.

GUIDING PRINCIPLES

To provide a forum for furthering
the growth and professionalism of
the meetings industry with a
commitment to excellence and high
ethical standards. We perform this
mission through programs which
promote education, community
involvement and networking.

MISSION

The Place Where
Meeting Planners Meet

VISION

Provide an atmosphere for the
sharing of ideas with peers,
planners and suppliers.

Networking

Professionalism
Promote meeting management
as a viable and worthwhile
career with an emphasis on
the professional certification
of members.

Organization
Maintain sufficient organizational and financial resources
to support programs.

Membership
Maximize membership growth,
retention and involvement.

Community Outreach
Provide funds and services to
support the local community
and provide a vehicle for
organization recognition.

Education
Provide educational opportunities for our members, at
various levels to enhance
professionalism and stay
abreast of industry trends.

GOALS

-

-

ACTION PLANS

-

-

-

-

survey and industry
referrals to select quality
speakers and topics
Revise new member registration process to ask
desired committee
Hold quarterly committee
fairs after meetings
Distribute new member
list to committee heads
Implement PR program
to report activities to the
local media

Step 1: Where are we now? (Situation Assessment)
Understanding the current situation is vital to
identifying the approaches needed to drive success.
A full understanding of the current situation includes an analysis of several areas. The list below
shows a sample list of assessment areas and one or
two of the key questions to be answered for each.

Customers – What are their current and future
needs? What are their perceptions of our performance?

Employees – What are their perceptions of our
organization and how we can improve? How
can we make them more effective in their roles?

Industry trends – What have been recent shifts
in the industry? What shifts are anticipated for
the future?

Competitors – How do we compare against our
competitors? What are their recent and anticipated initiatives?

Performance trends – How are we performing by
product, by market, by channel?

Recent goals and initiatives – How are we
achieving against our plan? How successful
have we been with recent initiatives?

Organization profile – What are our strengths
and areas for improvement with regard to our
organization structure, processes, technology,

Customer Views

culture, etc.?
Often, planning teams summarize the current
situation information into a SWOT: a summary of the
organizations key strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats.
Step 2. Where do we want to be? (Strategic Direction)
The heart of strategic direction setting is this
second step. In our Drivers Model, the information
from the situation assessment is combined with the
understanding of future trends to develop the vision
statement and the mission statement.

Vision – the organization’s preferred picture of
the future

Mission – the overall purpose of the organization (i.e., what the organization does, for whom
it does it, and the benefit)
The second page shows a sample segment of
the strategic plan for a trade association of meeting
planners. While the mission speaks to “what they
do, for whom, and the benefit,” the vision describes
what the future will look like if the organization
achieves its mission.
The strategic direction setting also includes the
defining of goals and objectives.

Goals – the broad, long-term aims that define
accomplishment of the mission

gets that measure the accomplishment of a
goal over a specified period of time.
Each goal has a specific set of objectives, as
shown below for the membership goal.
The objectives establish the bar for the rest of
the planning effort. All the strategies, action plans
and investments should be focused on achieving
one or more of the plan objectives. Therefore, it is
critical that you select the right objectives for
measuring our success. Establishing objectives is
perhaps the toughest work in planning.
The planning effort also includes establishing
Guiding Principles - general guidelines that set the
foundation for how the organization will operate.
Guiding principles are more than just a statement
of values. Guiding principles also describe the actions the organization will take based on the values.
Step 3 – How do we plan to get there?
(Implementation Planning)
Once the objectives are established, the next
step is to develop the road map for achieving the
direction. For the road map to be viable, however,
it must focus on three areas in particular.

The barriers to achieving the goals and objec-

tives indicate those challenges which the organization must overcome to achieve its strategic direction. Barriers answer the following
questions: “Why haven’t we achieved our
goals already? What is standing in our way?”

While barriers address the challenges, the critical success factors identify those key conditions that must be met to achieve the goals.
Critical success factors, typically no fewer than
two and no more than seven per goal, serve as
a guide for determining the strategies to be
developed.

The strategies that are undertaken (i.e., the
road map) must drive achievement of the strategic direction by controlling the critical success factors and overcoming the barriers.

An important activity at this stage is the prioritization of strategies to determine the items to
focus on first. For each priority strategy, an
action plan is developed which details steps,
responsibilities, costs and timetables. The
action plans can then be summarized to identify resource requirements and to develop a
resource plan to meet those requirements.

VISION
The place where meeting
planners meet

MISSION
To provide a forum for
furthering the growth and
professionalism of the
meetings industry

Strategies
 Utilize assessment survey and industry referrals to
select quality speakers and topics
 Revise new member registration process to ask
desired committee
 Hold quarterly committee fairs after meetings
 Distribute new member list to committee heads
 Implement PR program to report activities to the local
media

Barriers
 Inadequate process for getting new members involved results in
burn-out of a few and low retention
 High membership turnover hinders consistent growth
Cutline missing

Step 4 – How will we monitor progress? (Monitoring)
Many organizations benefit simply from going
through the process of creating a strategy. At this
point, everyone is clear on where we are going and
how we plan to get there. However, the key value
to strategy development comes in the
implementation of the plan. Unfortunately, all too
often, strategic plans become space fillers on an
executive’s bookshelf. To prevent this occurrence,
we recommend a structured monitoring process
every three-to-six months.
The structured review involves:
Assessing progress on strategies
Grading the current and projected
performance against the objectives
Identifying changes in the environment,
new barriers, additional critical success
factors
Making adjustments to the objectives
Re-establishing priorities for strategies,
removing strategies and adding new
strategies as needed
While often a sobering process, this detailed
level of monitoring provides a method for ensuring
that the long-term strategy stays on the front
burners, despite the pressures of the day-to-day
business operation.

26 | IAF EUROPE NEWSLETTER | 08/2010

Michael Wilkinson is Managing Director
of Leadership Strategies, a company that specializes in meeting facilitation and facilitation training (www.leadstrat.com). He is the author of The
Secrets of Facilitation and The Secrets to Masterful Meetings and primary author of the firm’s
course, The Effective Facilitator, a four-day class
taught monthly in Atlanta, Georgia, and quarterly in cities around the United States. He is
one of less than a dozen Certified Master Facilitators worldwide and was named Facilitator of
the Year for 2003 by the Southeast Association of
Facilitators. He has presented at IAF European
Conferences in 2008 and 2009.

World Cafe gives voice
to Scottish students
By Inverclyde Now and Fiona MacNeill

The world cafe concept recently helped students at a new Scottish primary school cope much
more effectively with major changes in their school
and their lives. The event, called Cafe Change, allowed more than 60 primary school students,
teachers and parents at Aileymill Primary School in
Greenock to explore powerful questions around
behaviour, support, taking a positive approach to
change, and making the transition from primary to
secondary education.
The pupils have just come together through
the amalgamation of two local primary schools,
Earnhill and Ravenscraig, which merged to form
Aileymill Primary and Nursery, which opened in a
new state of the art school building in March 2010.
The P7 pupils are also about to embark on their
transition to high school, as they will join the new
Inverclyde Academy in Greenock this August.
“It has been an incredibly demanding year
for our pupils with the move into the new school
not long before their transition again into Inver-

clyde Academy,” said Aileymill Primary School head
teacher Isabel Lind. “As this Aileymill Café Change
is something that has never been part of either
school before, it is helping us cement a real feeling
of being Aileymillers together.”
Fiona MacNeill Associates of Glasgow organized the event for the school, choosing the world
cafe model because it allowed for an approach that
was informal, inclusive, and valued everyone's contributions.
“Sometimes Scots are reticent about expressing their opinion,” said Isabel. “It is all part of
our psyche. So at Aileymill we feel particularly
strongly about giving a voice to young people and
encouraging them to articulate how they feel, in
their own voice, which is precisely what the Café
sets out to do. Some of the best ideas I’ve taken
forward have come from the youngsters and I’m
sure this journey will prove just as rewarding.
“This is a fabulous opportunity for us to be
working with the professionals at Fiona MacNeill

THE AILEYMILL CAFÉ QUESTIONS
Topic Area – Behaviour

How will you take personal responsibility
for your behaviour?

What kind of things can you do and say to
make the start at Inverclyde Academy as
good as it can be?
Topic Area – Support
���
Why is it important that you take positive
action if things are not working out the
way you want them to?

If you were getting all the support you

Associates and to be doing something quite unique
within the school environment for pupils, parents
and teachers, as well all learn together on equal
terms,” Isabel added. “It helps demonstrate to the
pupils that we are always learning and that it
should be pleasurable.”
Said Fiona: “Working with the school is
something close to my heart. Not only is Greenock
my home town, my sister Catriona Miller is a P7
teacher at Aileymill Primary. We are using World
Café and its concepts more and more in our work
and we are really excited about discovering how
this will engage young people.
“It is an emergent process that expects no
right or wrong answer and has no purpose other
than encouraging conversation centred on the
questions. Everyone has a voice and everyone’s
story is important, as it provides an image of how
people see themselves now and in their future.”
Everyone had a chance to be part of four
different conversations, to distil what they think
have been the most significant themes and to sum
up what this means to them personally in terms of
their rights and responsibilities. FMA created a
document for the school, along with a credit-card
sized summary that participants can keep as a
reminder of their commitments to themselves and
others.
The FMA team was joined for the day by Peter
Risk, the Regional Director of Her Majesty's Courts
Services (HMCS) based in Bristol, with whom FMA
has used the World Cafe model, and by Louise

28 | IAF EUROPE NEWSLETTER | 08/2010

needed when you get to Inverclyde
Academy, what would that feel like?
Topic Area – Positive Change

What opportunities does going to
Inverclyde Academy present to you?

If you were looking back at your first year
at Inverclyde Academy, what would you
like to be remembering?

If you had the courage to talk about one
thing now that you think would make a
difference to you moving to Inverclyde

Brennan-Stewart, an art teacher from Glenburn
School who created a visual memory of the day.
HMCS, an executive agency of the Ministry of Justice, is responsible for managing the Magistrates’
Courts, the Crown Court, County Courts, the High
Court and Court of Appeal in England and Wales.
As well as being a table host, Peter provided
an overview of his journey through life and his
experience with FMA and the World Café Change
process to kick off the day. “I’m participating in
the Aileymill Café Change because I truly believe in
FMA and the World Café experience that they deliver,” he said. “We have had an incredibly effective partnership over the past three years and this
is my opportunity to give something back.
“The World Café is powerful and we have
used the concept successfully with staff throughout
the South West. It encourages teamwork and gets
people to look at issues and problems differently.
In my experience, it generates many new ideas and
enthusiasm.
“I’ll also be talking about influence. Wouldn’t it be great if we could persuade the Prime Minister, the head teacher, our parents or friends to do
what you want? But in reality, we all have limited
influence over others, even those very close to us.
There is only one person you can truly influence
and that is yourself. At the end of the day, the
one person you can control is yourself.
“The Aileymill Café Change will hopefully
leave the head teacher with people who are much
closer, with renewed enthusiasm and new ideas to
take forward into their future.”

"We are very grateful to Aileymill Primary
School for creating this opportunity for us,” said
Fiona MacNeill. “We all enjoyed a fantastic day with
laughter, music, conversations and challenges. The
resulting commitments will be a useful reminder to
the children about their rights and responsibilities
as they make the transition to secondary school.
We discovered what mattered to them is exactly
what matters to adults in an organisational setting
- self esteem, having friends, belonging, being supported and doing the best they can. It was a fascinating window on humanity and how we relate to
each other."

ARTICLE

30

The Nearest Exit May
Be Behind You
By Gillian Martin Mehers

Before I started a workshop recently, I checked
both of the Fire Exit doors to make sure they were
not locked (believe me, it happens). I also roamed
around outside the workshop room to find the fire
extinguisher, which I knew was there somewhere
(under a table - in plain sight if you are 1 meter
tall or less). I also checked with the building maintenance team to see where the rally points were in
case of evacuation.
These are things I do regularly now
when I work in a new venue, and check again in
familiar ones. Then I'll start my facilitation work
with a group by reminding them of these safety
features, often before we get to the objectives of
our day. Sometimes I format this information as
quiz questions, to keep it light yet still draw their
attention to it - it's amazing how many people
don't remember these features in their own buildings. (I'll admit that I didn't either!)

30 | IAF EUROPE NEWSLETTER | 08/2010

This practice is drawn directly from my work
with companies. In the past few years I've worked
more and more with large private sector groups,
many representing heavy industry, in and around
their own buildings. Many businesses will start
their meetings with a reminder of this information.
In some cases they might do something more substantial called "Safety Shares", or "Health and
Safety Shares." I even worked in one company HQ
that asked visitors to watch a video about building
safety in the reception area before they were able
to enter the work space for our meeting (where
they then still got the Health and Safety Share).
The Health and Safety Shares that I saw
were interesting in that they provided opportunities to show statistics about some aspect of safety
in the company or in the country/region where it is
located. For example, in one workshop a company
participant lead the Health and Safety Share with

ARTICLE

31

statistics on how many people have accidents from
falling down staircases (one UK report stated that
28,602 people were hospitalised for falling down
stairs in 2007-2008). This statistic supported the
company's stringent rule (signs everywhere) for
holding handrails on the staircases in all the buildings and installations - an earnest rule that sometimes made visitors smile.
In that particular workshop, which was cross
-sectoral and focused on sustainability, we brought
in the "E" of "HS&E" which is now what many companies have renamed their Health and Safety departments (Health, Safety & Environment). After the
staircase information another participant added
some statistics about how many plastic bottles are
being used, to sensitise people people about waste
(15 million plastics bottles are used each day in the
UK!) This was presented by one of the NGO participants as the "Environment" part of the "HS&E
Share" and framed as a way to help society "hold
the earth's handrail." It was both clever and profound as a way to interpret HS&E in today's corporate social responsibility environment.
These Shares might also be complemented
by inputs from the participants on things that they
see on their way to work - safety infractions or
good practice - as a way to bring the messages into
their daily life, rather than just norms that are followed at work. All in all, this kind of HS&E share
took about 10 minutes before the workshop (we
even started a little early to take this into account),

and was an interesting and thoughtful way to bring
both the practical personal safety aspect into the
room (including how to get out of it, fast!), as well
as to position the workshop discussion in a much
wider social context.
If you look around you right now, do you
know where the emergency exit is? A fire extinguisher? Your local recycling station?

IAF Europe Newsletter columnist Gillian
Martin Mehers is director and head of learning
at Bright Green Learning @Atadore SARL, in
Crans-près-Céligny, Switzerland. She blogs
regularly about facilitation and learning at
www.welearnsomething.com
You can reach Gillian at gillian@mehers.com.

08/2010 | IAF EUROPE NEWSLETTER | 31

MEMBER NEWS

32

Welcome, new and returning members
(July 2010)
We are delighted to welcome new members
who joined IAF in July:


Emma Langman, United Kingdom

Frank Little, Netherlands


Suresh G. Gunaratnam, Turkey


Neil Oliver, United Kingdom


Afrodita Kermicieva-Panovska, Macedonia


Mariette (Jet) Proost, Netherlands


Bertil Lofkvist, Sweden


Anna Ptasnik, Sweden


Gayle Rice, United Kingdom


Vernon Ringland, United Kingdom


Lisa Sloan, United Kingdom


Wolfgang Schmitz, Vanuatu


Peter van Beuningen, Netherlands


Mikko Syrjanen, Finland

We are equally delighted to welcome
back the following members who renewed
their memberships during July:


Sophie Treinen, Italy

A new IAF Board nominations &
elections process for 2010
By Martin Gilbraith, IAF Board Vice Chair (Chair Elect) | vice.chair@iaf-world.org
Please get in touch if you are interested to
get more involved with IAF, to help the Association to grow and better serve its members
and the facilitation profession!
Last year, IAF members approved some
revisions, proposed by the Board, to the Association’s Bylaws. These revisions provided for
the creation of local IAF chapters around the
world. This is a key plank of our strategy to
deliver greater value to members and grow
the Association by bringing IAF and its members closer together, and is now getting underway.
Another way we aim to bring IAF and its
members closer to each other is by a new
Board nominations and elections process
which we are now launching. This is designed
to bring our practice in line with the newly
revised Bylaws, and bring greater openness,
transparency and democracy to the IAF’s leadership and governance.
I have posted three documents with further details to the members’ area of the IAF

32 | IAF EUROPE NEWSLETTER | 08/2010

Forum at www.iaf-forum.org, and these are
also available on request from me or the IAF
office (see below). These are:

the new nominations & election policy &
procedure itself, with an outline plan for
how it will be piloted in 2010 and also
essential & desirable qualities for the
roles

a succession planning chart showing
present and recent incumbents of each
role, and which roles are vacant or coming vacant this year

the 2009 Bylaws themselves, which include an overview of each role. Detailed
role descriptions for each role are now
under review by the Board and will be
available shortly.
Most immediately, we are seeking 3-7
members to form a new volunteer Board
Nominations Committee, to oversee the process and ensure that it is fair and transparent.
That committee will then be seeking nominations for members to stand for election in the

autumn to the global Board of Directors.
The volunteer Board of Directors comprises
17 roles – four Officers (Chair, Vice- Chair,
Treasurer & Secretary), six Strategic Initiative
Directors (Communications & Publications,
Community Outreach, Conferences, Membership & Affiliates, Sponsorship/ Endorsement
and Professional Development) and seven
Regional Directors (Africa, Asia , Australia/New
Zealand , Canada , Europe , Latin America &
Caribbean, and USA).
Ten of these 17 Director roles will be open
for nominations this year – eight due to the
expiry of their two-year terms in December,
and two due to their serving Directors retiring
mid-term. We are expecting up to three of the
presently serving Directors to stand for reelection to a second term, and we have already had a few expressions of interest in
other posts as well. However, the election for
each post is open to as many candidates as
choose to stand for it, and we would welcome
having more than one candidate for each post
in order that the members have a real choice
in exercising their vote!
We are now seeking candidates for the
Nominations Committee, by August 16th. That
committee will later announce the deadline for

candidates for election to the Board – likely
early September, for elections in October.
Nominations Committee members will be expected to commit to serving only this year at
first (until the election process is complete, by
December at the very latest), but we hope at
least some may be willing to serve next year
as well.
We are particularly keen that the Nominations Committee, and the Board itself, reflect
as far as possible the diversity of the IAF
membership and the facilitation profession, as
well as bringing the appropriate skills and
experience to the roles. So, please consider
whether you would be willing to volunteer to
serve IAF in this way!
Download further details from the IAF Forum at www.iaf-forum.org, or ask to have
them sent to you by me (chair.elect@iafworld.org) or the IAF office (office@iafworld.org). Please raise any questions on the
Forum, or directly with me or any other Board
member. I shall be away on leave from July 26
-August 9, but I look forward to responding
before or after then.
I look forward to hearing from you, and
thank you for your support and commitment
to our Association and our profession.

Method of the Month - Movie Posters
Courtesy of IAF Methods Database www.iaf-methods.org
We see posters advertising new movies
quite often in public places. They summarize
with visual images, a dramatic title and a few
critical phrases, an entire story and its
characters. This method aims at letting the
group create the poster for their “movie”. It
can be used for summarizing learning, for
reporting on team activities over the past
period of time, for building a common story

about something that has taken place in the
organization.
Introduction
In order to create today’s reports,
imagine that you are creating a movie. In one
hour, please return with the poster for your
movie (like the posters you see in public
places advertising movies).
continued on next page...
08/2010 | IAF EUROPE NEWSLETTER | 33

MEMBER NEWS

33

MEMBER NEWS

34

Think, for example, of the posters for
“Gone with the Wind”, for “Star Wars”, for
“Mr. And Mrs. Smith”. (Refer to posters you
yourself have seen recently.) The poster tells
the story. Distribute flipchart paper and lots of
colored markers.
Procedure for the teams
1. First of all, review the elements of the story
you want to communicate.
2. Secondly, decide what sort of story you
would like to tell. For example, you could:
Make an epic, like “The little team that
could…”
You could create a fable: “Once upon a
time, in a humble IT department far
away…
You could create a first person story: “I
looked terror in the eyes when I saw.”
You could be the International news
bureau and interview team members
about their achievements: “An exclusive
interview with.
You could be one of the customers who
explains how his problem was solved,:
“We thought we were doomed, until…
Etc

3. Now create your poster. It should have four
elements:
Title of your story
Subtitle that explains what the story is
about
3 scenes from the story
One critical line from your story: a
supporting quotation, a line from one of
your characters, etc.
Closing Reflection
Have an art-gallery sort of area where
teams can hang their posters and everyone
(perhaps as a tea and coffee break) can visit
and read what is posted.
Close with reports from each team (if a large
group, ask only for the titles and subtitles)
and a reflection on what people have seen
and heard:
What were some of the poster images
that struck you?
What phrases are still ringing in your
mind?
What were ways of telling our story that
really “worked” for you?
What were some new insights you had
into what we are doing here?
What would you say is our next step
with this story?

Facilitation Workshops and
Meetings 2010-2011
Find out more details about specific
events listed here by visiting the Workshops
and Meetings section of the IAF Europe Forum (http://www.iaf-europe.eu) If you would
like to let others know about an event you
are organizing, please email rosemary.cairns@iaf-europe.eu.